COMPARISON OF FISH COMMUNITY STRUCTURE ON ARTIFICIAL REEFS DEPLOYED AT DIFFERENT DEPTHS ON TURKISH AEGEAN SEA COAST

Abstract

Deployment depth of artificial reefs is one of the most important issue in planning stage and future success. Most of the studies aimed at determination of fish community around artificial reefs were conducted mainly 10-25m depths in Mediterranean and Aegean Sea. The goals of this study are determine and compare of fish community structure around artificial reefs which deployed 20, 30 and 40 m depths. Underwater visual census technique was used to determine fish species, number of individual and size estimation. There was no statistical difference (p>0.05) in mean fish biomass and number of individual between the depths. But mean species number was significantly greater on 20 m in comparison to 30 m and 40 m depths (p<0.05). Furthermore, calculated values of Jaccard and Bray-Curtis indexes showed low similarity (min. 3% - max. %37) between depths.